Sub Finem
by Ratatosks
Summary: "...I still can't believe that this is the end. No, it's more like I don't want to believe it. The only person I deemed worthy of taking my life was L himself, but to go this way is pathetic." Light Yagami is dying, and he's visited by a familiar ghost of his past.


**asdfjkl; i wrote this two years ago but never posted it, and i'm a sucker for light/l so here ya go**

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I can feel everything slip away - slip away like sand through my fingers. I still can't believe that all my plans had been foiled by a teenager a thousand times inferior to L. As if to further my embarrassment, that moron Matsuda found the gall to fire his gun at _me_. At God. At Kira.

Blood stains my neatly-pressed suit and pools around me on the floor as I cling onto the threads of life. I know that if I don't die from the gunshot wounds first, Ryuk will surely kill me off and obtain whatever bleak minutes I have remaining; that is what he promised to me so many years ago. My whole body throbs and burns. Even the slightest movement is excruciatingly painful. Part of me almost _wants_ to hurry up and die.

...I still can't believe that this is the end. No, it's more like I don't want to believe it. The only person I deemed worthy of taking my life was L himself, but to go this way is pathetic, just like all the criminals I purged. The perfect world I envisioned - what will happen to it? Will Misa continue passing righteous judgement and act as Kira? No, she shouldn't. I hated her at times; I had wanted her dead, but she had always been so loyal. Endangering her any further would extinguish Kira's last supporters.

My pulse is slowing down, and...what's this? Wet, bitter, salty tears sting the corners of my eyes. For the first time since my childhood, I begin to cry. I quietly call out for my dead father, my mother, who will surely be devastated when she finds out what's become of me, and Misa, who truly loved me to no avail.

I continue my whimpering for a few minutes, knowing that there is no one near to comfort me, when suddenly, I see a bright figure standing over me. I am startled and frightened, wondering if one of the task force or SPK members has come to finish me off, but after blinking several times to focus my vision, I immediately recognize the indistinguishable figure of L.

His countenance is so familiar and comforting, I am overwhelmed. He was the one I wanted to be near the most throughout my most recent battles, though I wouldn't dare call out his name in my final moments. I didn't want Ryuk to see that I was weak enough to want my enemy.

It was more than that, though…

My mind is suddenly flooded with memories: when L first introduced himself to me, when I worked on the investigation with him, nights sleeping at the very edge of the bed while handcuffed to him, and when I held his cold, limp body in my arms, grinning triumphantly, feeling a faint twinge of regret in my heart.

I want him to take _me _into his arms now and hold me close as I die. I want him to whisper that everything will be all right. I want him to kiss me once before the light of day finally fades away and take me away, but I know that's all an idiotic fantasy. L is a statue before me, and the moment I wrote Kurou Otoharada's name in the Death Note, my fate was sealed; I would fade into Mu - fade into nothingness.

I doubt he's here to comfort me. If this is some ghost of the former detective, he's more than likely waiting for Ryuk to take me down the same way I took him down. Nevertheless, I want to believe that L is here with good intentions.

Maybe he's not even here. Maybe this is "my life flashing in front of my eyes" moment because L _was _my life. Nothing else mattered except the battle between him and Kira. He truly was a worthy opponent unlike his pathetic successors who won thanks to sheer luck and everything L had already discovered. The sheer humiliation of having lost to mere _children_ makes my blood, or whatever I have left inside my body, boil.

I truly am a sad sight right now, heaving as much air as my lungs can take to savor how breathing feels. Dried blood cakes my hands, and my body is twisted and contorted in strange ways, too weak and injured to move.

I begin to murmur, "L…L…" over and over. Hearing his voice would be a miracle, but then again, I don't even deserve his presence.

L remains a statue as I moan and writhe, and it seems like hours pass as my voice becomes more choked and barely audible. He extends a hand out to me.

The tears stream harder and faster as I muster all my remaining strength to raise my arm. It's nearly impossible to get it off the floor; it feels like the weight of the world is crushing down on me. But I need to tell him that I love him. I need to. I need to.

"_Well, Light, it's been interesting."_

I need to.


End file.
